What's left behind

Laura, staff member

Trigger warning - suicide

I can honestly say I had a good life; I grew up in a secure bubble and never experienced hardship or adversity. I remember one occasion a few years ago, talking to my closest childhood friends about how lucky we all were to have had such a happy childhood, getting through those teenage years unscathed, loved being a student and university life, finding careers which we enjoyed, getting married and ultimately settling down. However despite the fact that my life sounded like something from a chick lit novel, I wasn’t naive to the fact that one day my bubble may burst. The big bang occurred on May 22nd 2012. It was an ordinary Tuesday morning when I received a phone call from my father telling me that my brother Conor had died. That was the moment which changed my life beyond recognition.

The walk/run talk experience

Bríd, staff member

Well don’t you just hate it when you read articles giving advice about how to help yourself feel a bit better, stay positive, or banish the blues!!! I really want to dislike the Grit Doctor who writes in the Health Supplement of the Irish Times every Tuesday, she is as her title suggests tough and gritty and I could imagine that if she was standing behind you that you would experience such a kick up the posterior that it may land you into next week! However, sometimes her words resonate and when she talks about running in such a positive light, helping to keep the body fit, clear the head, raise the endorphins and having that feel good factor to name but a few, it does make a lot of sense.

Normality

Anon., student

Trigger warning - self harm

A lot people in the college don't actually know me. So first I am a 23 year old girl, a single mum to a 2 year old girl and a full time career to my 27 year old brother as well as full time student..

I was diagnosed with depression when I was 14, I was self harming. I started self harming on my legs as no one would be able to see then I started on my arms. I started self harming when my sister had died in a car accident as I felt there was no one listening to me and hurting myself released any pain I had for a few minutes.

Letting go to move forward

Shauna, staff member

My story with depression started when my 1st child was born but if I were honest it started further back than that. If anybody told me that I would feel indifferent or distant from my beautiful and vulnerable little baby I would have told them they were crazy to say such a thing, but unfortunately that is exactly what happened, I could feel nothing but absolute sadness and helplessness and resentment as to why I had to take care of my baby. I didn’t dare tell anyone how I felt as I thought that I would lose my husband and lose my baby. I knew about post natal depression but I didn’t think for once that I was suffering with it. I thought that I was a horrible person for thinking such selfish thoughts never thinking for once that there could be something wrong with my mental state.

Depression olympics

Mark Laherty, Student Leader

There was this music building in my old boarding school. It was the one place where nobody was likely to find you, where the pace of the day didn’t feel so tightly wound. It was two years ago, give or take a few days, when I ducked in there and curled up in the corner for half an hour.

On the rare occasion that mainstream media decides to show mental illness, it does so through some major attention-grabbing demonstration, like bursting into tears, or a big long self-loathing monologue. Hell, most of the time, all we have are Batman villains written to have funny stares and no empathy. All this is, of course, hardly a reflection of reality. By all means, people do break down and burst into tears, but it’s not the only way that someone can break.

Why talk?

Fiona Kennedy, NUIG staff

Some of you might know me from my other life as blogger Sunny Spells and Scattered Showers. Some of you might know me as Fiona from HR who works on the bike to work scheme. Most of you probably don't know me at all. In a nutshell, I'm married, have two kids, work half time here in NUIG and took a notion to get involved with the Please Talk campaign. I also have clinical depression and borderline personality disorder, although thankfully both are in hand at the moment and I'm well.